Static and Dynamic Structural Analyses for Wave Energy Converter with Oscillating Body and Connection Arm

Abstract

Studies on renewable energy generation systems are increasing with the growth of problems for the existing energy resources such as fossil fuels. Among the renewable energy generation, the generation in an offshore site is in limelight due to various energy resources and vast space. Wave energy generation using the potential and kinetic energies of the wave is possible to produce large-capacity energy generation considering installation site and characteristic of a system. In this work, the structural analyses on the arm structure of oscillating type wave energy converter are conducted. This type of structure consists of a support structure, floater, and connection arm connecting the structures. And PTO (Power Take-Off) device is attached to connection arm and has the role of maintaining a generation efficiency by controlling motions of the floater. As wave-induced force from floater, and PTO damping one are applied to connection arm, the structure must have structural safety enough for environmental conditions. To perform the structural analyses on connection arm, static and dynamic analyses could be used. Static analysis method have the advantage of simple modeling and fast computation time rather than dynamic one. But this analysis method cannot deal with dynamic property of a structure in the time domain. Thus, in case that needs to consider these dynamic phenomenon, a time-domain dynamic analysis should be performed. In this study, the results of two analysis methods are compared and the application of the methods is considered.